I hate to say it, but some of it is too confusing for practicing lawyers. Not that the concept of being ethical is confusing, but the good intentioned rules that are revised more often than most lawyers read them are subject to varying interpretation. Don't worry, depending on what state you practice in, you'll take enough Ethics CLE each year to be appreciative of the fact that you didn't waste extra time or money on it in law school. Good luck with school, your bar exam, and finding a decent job.
Thanks for the well wishes
While no one can doubt ethics can certainly get confusing, especially with the complexity of law being so utterly confusing and specialized.... I would hope the basics, that spread across all areas of law wouldn't be too much to handle. I also think ethics important enough to introduce early and often. The Bar Assoc. publishes a scandal section... pages long... detailing the outright felonious actions of currently practicing lawyers. Oddly enough, it also lists traffic violations...
Enough blather, time for another amusing story.
In my contracts class we were going over the concept of Good Faith, a princepal actually detailed in the Uniform Commerical Code. Its just about as simple as it sounds. Good faith has two parts, one subjective (honesty in fact) and the other objective (being in line with the current practices of the trade). The basic idea is that a contract is supposed to be a bargain struck between two or more parties for mutual advantage, everybody wins. You are not supposed to try and swindle someone with small print.
One of my classmates (my ex-housemate in fact) could not understand this concept. I chuckled at this because I know why he finds the idea difficult. In the current lingo of the board, he is an asshat, regulery engaging in asshatery.
